• CHAPTER 3

       Gabriel looked at her in confusion. He knew her very well and understood many things about her personality and intuition. The thing that he knew about her which caught his attention is that NOTHING is weird to her.
       "What do you mean, babe?"
       She hesitated for a minute or two, then answered.
       "Well, we went to bed together like always. I layed on your chest 'til I fell asleep. You pet me like you've done so many times only this was different, given we'd just had sex. Anyway I awoke at about 3:45 a.m. And you weren't there." A look of concern came over her face as she continued. "I searched everywhere for you. The other bedrooms,  
    the bathroom, the office, the livingroom, everywhere. Then I 
    remembered your psychic episodes you'd had when we were younger."
       Gabriel took these words in with a stunning revelation. He'd had another psychic moment, this one so strong and possibly dangerous that it caused retrograde amnesia. 
       Gabe developed psychic abilities on his 10th birthday, just as his father did. He knew it true when he saw his  
    father, who'd died 3 years after Gabriel's birth, in his bedroom. It was the single most terrifying moment of his life. He could still smell the urine in his bed from that day. The man was covered in blood with a gaping whole in his head and heart. He smelled of something vile and putrid. Flies were all around him. 
       But none of this scared Gabriel. Such horrific scenes were witnessed by he and his dad when he was young and his dad joked that he'd appear to him like that if he died. It was the evil, souless look in his father's cold black eyes that disturbed and frightened him so. It was something he'd never forget.
       For a year after that he'd have episodes at the end of which he'd awake in the basement, never remembering what happened for more than a couple hours. He'd recorded these events in a diary he kept in a hidden compartment under his bed. Had he brought it with him? The question raced through his head and his fast beating heart.
       Rose saw the look in his eyes and knew she'd struck a tender nerve. "Oh I'm sorry baby. I didn't mean to..."
       "No," Gabe interrupted. "It's okay. You didn't do anything wrong. Keep going."
       "Okay." She seemed hesitant to continue and felt as if her words may kill him. "So I checked the basement and got this really eerie feeling. I could swear something was down there with me. Something that wanted to hurt me, to humiliate me. I didn't see you so I got the hell outta there quick. Then, as I reached the top of the basement steps and closed the door, I heard footsteps upstairs, so I went to check it out. No one was there. I figured maybe it was you heading back to bed so I did the same. But just as I got to the bedroom door I heard a loud BANG followed by heavy footsteps. I thought someone in 
    boots had broken in the house and was in the attic."
       Her eyes began to fill with terror at the recounting of the 
    previous night's events. Her breathing became deeper, heavier. Her heart beat was so fast that she thought it might leap out her chest.
       "I ran upstairs and followed the hallway." Her eyes filled with tears. "When I reached the door someone, or something, ran past and slammed the door shut in my face. It locked and I couldn't get it open. Then, as I started to turn around, someone whispered my name in my ear." She was crying now. Gabriel began to fear what it was she'd felt.
       "I ran out of the house and called the cops. As I ran down the stairs, I heard two screams. The first was you, obviously afraid of something. I thought you were afraid of nothing until that. The second was something else. I don't know what it was, but it was in no way..."
       "Human?"